How to make a simple and effective storytelling for your business 2020

At all times, members of the same tribe met in the evening around a fire, at the foot of a fir tree or a baobab tree to stage realistic journeys or whimsical adventures. In addition, all the great leaders, from Indian chiefs to Fidel Castro via Winston Churchill, excelled in storytelling….

Storytelling file

Would you too like to tell a story that inspires, captivates and makes you a selling machine? Maybe you have a business idea, but you have trouble communicating it? Through this article, I will detail the reason for the effectiveness of storytelling, present the simplest way to build the history of your business and share with you a precise structure for pitching your offer.

History is at the very foundation of humanity. With a touch of drama, to make the story exciting, the little stories we tell ourselves every day bring us closer. They give an identity to the group. They speak to emotions.

Anthropologically, myths, stories and other legends aim to structure the world where reason fails. And that’s why they also resonate perfectly with our emotions: because they lighten our consciousness. We let ourselves be rocked…

In marketing, the challenge of storytelling is twofold. First, the stories you decide to tell are the thread running through your content strategy. Otherwise it would go in all directions.

As analysts at Beckon show, 5% of the content created is read by 90% of the audience. By implication, this means that 95% of the content created is consumed by a small 10% of Internet users.

In other words, when you develop a content strategy in 2018, you have about 9 chances out of 10 (depending on your pre-existing audience) to work for not much at best, for nothing at worst. This sacred Pareto never lies!

Not only is it difficult to get the message out, but if the message is also not clear, the fruit of your written sweats may well be reduced like a skin of sorrow.

Here lies the double kiss cool effect of creating great stories: because it models the message around which all of your content points, it helps to simplify the necessarily complex and evolving vision of a business.

However, properly circumscribing the message of your business is giving consumers and customers the possibility of placing your activity within their perception of the world. And therefore to anchor yourself in people’s heads.

There are two unique ways to do this: hammering the characteristics of your product with billions of dollars or telling a great story.

2. The storytelling of your company

Of course, you cannot light up your audience if there is no fire in you! That’s why the best stories are at the crossroads of talent, passion and demand. Before moving on to building your legend ask yourself these few questions

Where is your business?

What efforts did you have to make to get there?

What is the next stage of your development?

What are the specifics of your field?

What lessons do you learn from your journey as a human, entrepreneur and marketer?

The few answers provided will not fail to help you locate yourself and highlight your efforts, your merit and your strength of character. Well done, we can move on!

2.1. The “why”: your reason for being

While most companies start by introducing themselves (a pompous and boring way to enjoy on just about all web pages about in French), the best brands start with their raison d’être.

And when you present yourself from that perspective, you attract a different type of audience, whose members are more active. Indeed, if they are there, it is because they share what you deeply believe in. This proactive audience is a real game changer which will give dynamism to your business.

2.2. The “how”: your principles

You are the bearer of a message, the embodiment of a philosophy, the representative of an idea. But how, through your professional activity, do you make this vision possible? This is called corporate culture.

The latter is framed by principles from which the meaning given to / perceived by your actions follows.

Answer these few questions on a scale of 1 to 10 and, most importantly, justify your results.

How do you rate your company’s risk appetite?

What importance do you attach to traditional rules?

What is most important? The result or the meaning given to the work?

How important is it to treat people with respect, even and especially when they fail?

How much do you care about social news and social issues and how are you involved in the community?

The goal is not to build a trendy identity for an organic company that does not care about its results, but just wants to bring something positive into people’s lives. You very well have the right to privilege the result in the sense, to put aside the people who fail and not to worry about social news. Especially if it is the rules of the environment in which you operate! (On the other hand if you wish to communicate the benefits of these characteristics, offer yourself the services of the best storytellers!)

2.3. The “what”: your offer

Eh yes ! It is only last that you talk about your services or products. Or in any case what is generally advised to do in storytelling. Although you can reverse the last 2 steps, depending on your preference.

This presentation technique takes the old model what-> how-> why where the company first talks about what it offers, then how it achieves it and then, ultimately, its raison d’être and the returns completely, hence the why-> how-> what.

That said, the important thing is to start with the “why”. Then, according to your innovation score and your involvement in the community, you give second place to the “how” for an average result greater than 6/10.

The ink of history that makes you so unique is ready and all you have to do is dip the tip of your pen, to scribble on your papyrus a text of about 1,500 characters. It’s short, but intense.

3. The storytelling of your product / service?

The copywriter who animates me must warn you: before proceeding to the fabulous history of your offer, it is absolutely necessary that you understand the huge crucially fundamental difference (weigh the rave prose!) Between the characteristic and the benefit of ‘a product.

While we all tend to present the characteristics of our offer since it meets what we consider to be a need, the truth is that people are bothering about its characteristics. They are only interested in what this product can do for them.

A messaging service has developed a mobile application. The commercial attaché will tend to include the application in the messaging service. However, the revolution does not lie in the application, but in the fact that the customer can read his emails from anywhere.

Do you see the difference ? The history of your product has nothing to do with its features, but the benefits that the customer enjoys after the purchase is made.

3.1. Identify the general need and the specific benefit

To better define the need that brings (potential) customers to your product, ask yourself these few questions:

What was the 1time product form?

Who were the first people to use it?

What would they have risked if they had not purchased the product?

How has the product evolved and why?

The goal is to identify precisely why people are coming to your particular product and how to optimize it.

3.2. Understand the role of the product in the customer life cycle

Your customers are alive! They evolve, just like you, and their needs vary. You are a doctor who understands the pains of his patients and who knows exactly what remedy to offer them and when.

Placing yourself in this time of product adoption is ensuring that you are always one step ahead of the competition!

The problem is not only anchored in a precise space-time, but it is indicative of a lifestyle not suited to its objectives. As the patient suffers from an unhealthy lifestyle: the doctor always presents the solution and the risk if he does not adopt it. Your product is the remedy: it has benefits and there are risks if it is not taken.

3.3. Develop the product slogan

It is not easy to reduce an entire speech to a single sentence. Still, the slogan is pretty much inevitable, because it will place you much more easily in people’s minds.

To adopt an effective and non-reducing slogan, simply choose the most solid benefit of your product. Brainstorm about 50 ideas and select 10, then 5. Before declaring the big winner of this verbal match, ask your customers or people around you which they prefer. From 1 to 5. The best score wins!

With all these delicious ingredients, cook a pitch of one minute, following this simple structure: the problem people face, the negative impact of it, what they miss because of this problem, why your product exists , what does your product bring to them, the main benefit drawn by the customers after the purchase and finally your logo accompanied by your slogan!

Who are you, what do you offer? I’m sure you have a great story to tell us…